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Scientist makes inroads on Lyme disease

By Delthia Ricks and Sophia ChangNewsday

Tues., Oct. 12, 2010

MELVILLE, N.Y.—A Stony Brook scientist has helped map the genetic family tree of the bacterial strains that cause Lyme disease, a finding that raises hopes for faster diagnosis and new vaccines, scientists said Tuesday.

Dr. Benjamin Luft and colleagues have been on the trail of Lyme disease for years, aiming to discover why some people are affected by symptoms that last a few weeks, while others develop invasive infections that attack major organ systems. The mapping of more than a dozen bacterial strains moves science a step closer to finding out.

The availability of such precise genetic information is expected to help develop diagnostic tests sensitive to the exact strain that has caused a patient’s infection, said Luft, a professor of medicine at Stony Brook University’s medical school. He presented his research Monday in Washington, D.C., at the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences.

Of the varying strains, Luft said some cause only a skin rash, while others, which he characterized as more serious, “go into the blood stream and spread throughout.”

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, cases of severe forms of Lyme disease — the most frequently transmitted tick-borne infection in North America —have been rising for two decades.

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Luft said he believes the new genetic information eventually could play a role in the development of vaccines. One vaccine — the first against Lyme disease, and developed before the findings were announced this week — is slated for human trials in January.

Working with a team of researchers from across the United States, Luft and colleagues parsed the entire genetic codes of 13 types of the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria that cause Lyme disease.

A renowned Lyme disease investigator, who was not connected with the study, said the work “is of enormous value” — an important advance with practical applications.

The researcher, Dr. Brian Fallon, director of Columbia University’s Lyme and Tick-borne Disease Research Center in Manhattan, said Tuesday that the current method of screening for Lyme is notorious for “being far too insensitive for early Lyme disease and for neurologic Lyme disease.”

“Mapping of these 13 strains will help us to learn more about the invasiveness and virulence of these particular strains, as well as whether they have unique clinical profiles,” Fallon said.

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